Four lifers

Since my new job's location doesn't let me cross Central Park on my way to work, I expect to see a lot fewer species in Manhattan than in the last few years. So this year, I've decided to go around the City on some weekends looking for life birds. The other week it was Prospect Park and the Black-Headed Gull, and this Saturday it was Flushing Meadow Corona Park. There had been recent reports of four species I'd never seen there.

yes, even the Snow Goose was a life bird. Don't judge me.

After getting off the 7 train at Willet's Point--and I can't stop thinking of the stop as "Shea Stadium", I entered the old World's Fair grounds and set off looking for something called the "Garden of Meditation" where there was supposed to be a flock of Juncos with a couple of exotic sparrows mixed in.

On the way, I spotted a small concrete-ringed body of water with a lot of geese on it. Since the other two species I was looking for were geese, I diverted over there. I believe it's called the "Pool of Industry". I love the feature names from the World's Fair; they are so very Space Age.

Anyway, on the lawn next to the Pool I spotted a large white goose hanging with a big flock of Canadas. It proved to be a (very cooperative) Snow Goose. Lifer number one!

With the help of a friendly photographer who had arrived at the Pool, I scanned for the two Cackling Geese that had been reported. They're very small geese with the same pattern as Canada Geese. The small size should jump out at you. No luck. He said that he'd just come from Meadow Lake (across the highway) where the Cacklings had usually been, and they weren't there either. We went off in search of sparrows.

The Meditation Garden held no birds of any kind. The area in front of the New York State Pavilion (where the target Junco flock had also been seen) was almost as empty, except a large flock of Starlings came down nearby. After a while, the photographer packed it in--the light was crappy and it was threatening rain. I decided to walk around the New York State Pavilion.

For reference, the NYS Pavilion is the thing with the big sci-fi-looking towers featured in Men In Black. It's in poor repair, though some restoration is being done. On the path behind the Pavilion, I spotted Juncos. With them, a couple of Pine Warblers.

extra attraction

The Juncos were spead out loosely between the path and a highway (there are highways running all around and through Flushing Meadow Park, thank you Robert Moses). I spotted a stripy-headed sparrow with them, but it proved to be just a White-Throated Sparrow. Then I spotted a very dull light-brown bird with a grey neck and a brown rump--the Clay Colored Sparrow. Lifer number two! He vanished quickly--Clay-Colored Sparrows are very good at vanishing--but then I spotted the boldly-patterned Lark Sparrow.

boldface

Lifer number three! He was at some distance, but shortly afterward there was a brief rain shower. The flock went up into the trees and I caught the Lark Sparrow posing. When it flew to a different tree, I noticed that it passed another brown sparrow.

cryptic sparrow

That is not really an identifiable view of a Clay-Colored Sparrow but it was the best photo I got of it.

Next I crossed over the highway to Meadow Lake in the southern part of the park. It was immediately apparent that the lake was mostly frozen over, and that there were no geese of any description on it. A smart man would have gone back. I decided to walk around the lake.

Considering that the terrain is quite flat, the walking was difficult. Very muddy in spots. Lots of Mallards and gulls on the lake shore, and some coots in the few open-water stretches, but not much else. A couple of Song Sparrows in the phragmites.

The south end of the lake seemed to recede as I walked on. Stubbornly I pushed on. At length I reached a playground and sat down at a picnic table to contemplate the bad life choices that had led me to this place.

Well, it seemed it was farther to go back then to continue around, so continue I did. I watched a rather dark Red-Tailed Hawk take off from a tree. after rounding the tip of the lake, I realized that the path ahead was fenced off. It would have been nice of the Parks Department to have signs up early on saying that the path around the lake wasn't passable.

Being tired and stubborn, I went on. I wound up walking along the highway off-ramp for a considerable distance, great fun. At length I completed the circuit and returned to the northern part of the park.

There I found birders in front of the NYS Pavilion, mostly from the Brooklyn Bird Club. The Junco flock was on the grass there, and they were tracking the special sparrows, which was not easy in the late-afternoon light.

where's Waldo?

But I did get looks at both the Clay-Colored and the Lark Sparrow again. Then I moved on, back to the Pool of Industry--for some reason I really want to put that in all-caps, but I'll resist--and another look for the Cackling Geese.

I have never seen so many geese in such a small area. They had all left the lawn. The Pool of Industry is an oval, maybe 120 feet long, and there were easily 500 Canada Geese in it, and the back end of it wasn't even full, just a few gulls there. So the geese were all crowded into, I don't know, a tenth of an acre? A few hundred square yards. It was Grand Central Station in there. I did not see any notably small geese.

The Brooklyn crew arrived. They didn't have any luck either. ("That one seems small" "Maybe? A little." [a minute later] "I can't find it in the crowd anymore." "That's not a good sign.")

Geese began to fly out in tens and twenties and thirties. That should make oddities easier to spot...

where's Waldo, part two. This was a bit later, with even fewer birds, so it's easy.

And then I saw them. "Hey, how about those? That group of four, the ones in the front look very small."

Boom! There it is.

And so they were. Lifer number four!

I watched the for a while--they hung out, mostly pretty close together. I think they found the larger Canadas a bit intimidating.

intimidating goose

All in all, six and a half hours in Flushing Meadow, six miles walked, four life birds. A good day.

Return of the son of the revenge of more Fall migration photos

Winter Wren working it for the camera

The thing about Fall migration is that it lasts a long time. Spring migration is a few intense weeks in May, with a slow build up for maybe a month. before, and a rather abrupt ending. Fall migration starts around the end of July and continues in a fairly steady stream for about three months.

So the less common birds get spread out a bit. Sort of.

lazy afternoon

This Whipoorwill turned up in the Loch in northern Central Park in late September. That's a nice bird for Manhattan; we get maybe one a year--more frequent than then Chuck-Will's-Widow, less frequent than Common Nighthawk.

Whipoorwills sleep most of the day, like owls, and wake up around dusk to hunt insects. They're hard to spot, since they don't move around much during daylight, and they generally roost pretty high up. This one was in an unusually low perch, the the photographers had a great time with him.

That same day, a Grasshopper Sparrow was spotted on the Knoll, also in the northern part of the Park just a short walk from the Whipoorwill's roost. I didn't see that bird, though. Well, maybe I did: I saw a very streaky backed sparrow fly by me that the other birders said was the Grasshopper. They had had a good look at it before, but for me, that wasn't enough of a view to count.

showing the flag

Then the next week, two fairly uncommon birds showed up at Harlem Meer. This female Green-Winged Teal spent a lot of time browsing a patch of duckweed in the southwest corner of the Meer near the little island.

The Green-Winged Teal is our smallest duck. Here's what that means:

size comparison

You see it's about half the size of the Mallard. You can almost ID it just on size.

Also on the Meer at the same time was a female American Wigeon. I had a heck of a time picking it out of the crowd of Gadwalls, even though they were all just a few feet off shore. It blended in surprisingly well.

semi-anonymous

The dark bill isn't all that striking when you're watching it swim around, and the coloring is a bit cryptic. Eventually I noticed that it was the only one never showing a white speculum, and then it became obvious.

bird of the evening

Besides the Grasshopper sparrow, Central Park has hosted a couple of other uncommon sparrows. A Vesper Sparrow spent the better part of a week in the area called Locust Grove, along a woodchip path just west of the Great Lawn between the Delacorte Theater and the Pinetum. It only liked to come out when the light was dim.

Of course, a lot of non-rarities continue to move through, like the Winter Wren at the top of this post, and this very confiding Pine Warbler:

warbler at my feet

He hopped around within a few feet of me, too busy foraging to worry about some slow monkey.

But there are signs the migration is ending, like the arrival of Juncos. They usually come right at the end.

sign of the end times

Yet another "Spring is Here" post

So it seems this my my third "Spring is here!" post in a row. Well, what can I say? The first Warblers have arrived!

Pine Warbler, a usual early-spring arrival

I saw my first Pine and Palm Warblers of Spring on Easter morning. The were at the southwest corner of the Great lawn, mostly ignoring the kids playing catch with their dad a few feet away.

Palm Warbler, also a reliable early bird

They did flush into a tree when people strolled by, not noticing them.

There were some Golden-crowned Kinglets there as well, looking very much like animated Easter eggs as they foraged in the grass.

Easter-egg bird

A couple of the Pine Warblers were about the most colorless I've ever seen--very drab even for a fall plumage bird, never mind Spring.

I was hypnotized by their grayness.

I haven't see any Yellow-Rumped warblers yet. Up to a couple of years ago, the Ramble was ankle-deep in them by this time in April. In 2013, there were those terrible Spring storms in the Gulf of Mexico which killed a huge number of early migrants, and the whoel Spring there were string north winds, I think the Yellow-Rumpeds went north inland that year--we hardly saw any in New York. last year they were a little more abundant, but nothing like before.

Anyway, other Spring migrants are arriving apace. The Black-Crowned Night Herons have started coming in; some of them will stay. Here's six of them in two willows--you can play "find the hidden birds".

Landscape with herons

There's been a Common Loon on the Reservoir for about a week, and someone spotted a Blue-Gray Gnatcatcher in the North Woods the other day.
Also, a few Winter birds are still around. I went up to Inwood Hill Park last friday to track down a Horned Grebe reported there by Joe DiCostanzo. I hadn't managed to see a Horned Grebe all winter--they're a normal bird in this region, but not so abundant around Manhattan--, so I was glad to catch this one before it left.

at last!

End of summer

I feel there should be some fine Japanese calligraphy on this one

This weekend was the technical end of Summer. Of course, that means that Fall migration is about halfway done already--more for some birds, such as shorebirds.

Despite that, there was a report on Saturday of a very unusual bird for New York, a Pectoral Sandpiper, at Muscota Marsh in Inwood Hill Park. They come through the region on migration in the Fall fairly regularly, but apparently there had never been one in Manhattan before.

Sunday morning, a report from eBird said the bird was still there, so off I went to the very northern edge of Manhattan.

The Pectoral gets its name from the fact that it's upper chest is quite buff. Seriously.

And there it was, hanging out with a couple of dozen Semipalmated Sandpipers. Our hero bird was notably larger and browner. I was very lucky--after I had watched the flock from some distance awhile, they took off---and landed not thirty feet in front of the bench I was sitting on.

Pectoral and Semipalmated Sandpipers synching up

I watched them there for a long time, then went off to see what was doing in the rest of Spuyten Duyvil Creek (answer: not much). When I returned, another birder told me that a Peregrine Falcon had flown in and perched atop a light tower at Baker Field (the Columbia University athletic complex right next to Inwood Hill Park). The sandpipers had mostly flown off, except a few very brave or very foolish Semipalmateds.

The Peregrine eventually gave up, but the Pectoral did not return while I was there. Which doesn't mean it's gone.

dinner is served

Meanwhile, in Central Park this weekend, migration also continued. Scarlet Tanagers, Rose Breasted Grosbeaks, and a good variety of warblers are all around. Oh, and hummingbirds. Did I mention the hummingbirds? They were all over the place.

right now, wherever there's jewelweed, there are hummingbirds

I also had a Red-Breasted Nuthatch at the Pinetum--my first of the year, and I had only one in all of 2013 as well--, a Kingfisher (always charming to see) and various confusing fall warblers. One of the warblers might have been a very dull Bay-Breasted, but most were Pine Warblers, I think.

confused Fall warbler

The Red-Breasted Nuthatch was my 178th species in New York County this year, and the Pectoral Sandpiper was my 179th (and a life bird).

Photo interlude

I didn't go anywhere interesting today. Nothing much came in today that I heard about--maybe a few more Black-and-White Warblers out on the Point--so here's a few recent photos I haven't put on the blog already.

Cedar Waxwings, I love their little pot bellies.

It's easy to overlook what a good-looking bird a White-Throated Sparrow is.

The drab Pine Warbler that spent most of the winter in the Ramble hasn't been seen in a while. I guess that's another story whose ending I'll never know.

We're still seeing the Baltimore Orio;les who overwintered near Evodia, though. I assume this male will have his pick of the best nesting areas, since there won't be any others for another week or two yet.

I wonder if this Ring-Necked drake I saw the other week is the one who was on the Reservoir during the winter. That one liked to pal arounmd with Mallards, too.

The "kwirr!" call of the Red-Bellied Woodpecker is a common sound in the Ramble now.

Catching up: Woodcocks in the Ramble; Spring closing in on Van Cortlandt Park

Sorry for the silence. Saturday, Elena and I went to Central Park. There were two American Woodcocks in the Ramble, just northeast of Azalea Pond. One of them gave us a pretty good look. The Pine Warbler is also still around; I saw it bathing in the Gill just north of Azalea Pond, along with the American Tree Sparrow and a Cedar Waxwing. And the Baltimore Orioles are still at the Evodia feeders.

Sunday we went to the Bronx to visit my aunt who's rehabbing after a hip replacement, and we spent an hour in the southwest part of Van Cortlandt Park. Spring is coming--there were red-Winged Blackbirds calling all over the place, especially in the little freshwater marsh south of the Van Cortlandt mansion. There were also several Titmouse (Titmice? Titmousim?) and Chickadees. Van Cortlandt is the only place either of us has seen Titmouse since last Spring. There was still a lot of snow and ice in the park, and the path south of the Parade Ground was completely flooded in spots (and bordered by very slick ice). I can see why the city wants the Central park conservancy to share some of its resources--Van Cortlandt could really use some help.

"Spring is coming!" "He is?"

Elena and I went to Central Park today.  We were particularly looking for the very early Pine Warbler that has been reported recently and for the American Woodcock reported in the Oven yesterday, which would be year birds for both of us.  The Woodcock especially is infrequent in the Park, and not common for New York in general.  Also we hoped for the American Tree Sparrow who has been seen around Evodia lately, which I have seen but Elena had not; and for Red-Winged Blackbirds, quite common but neither of us had seen any this year.

Well, we got them all.

First, we saw Cedar Waxwings between Maintenance and the Gill source.  Next, the Pine Warbler was practically the first bird we saw when we got to Evodia.  It was bouncing around on the ground just a few feet from the fence on the south side of the field.



Later the American Tree Sparrow showed up, and the female Baltimore Oriole who's been around all winter (didn't see the male today), and also a Rusty Blackbird,



and several Brown Creepers, and the other usual birds.  I could hear male Red-Winged Blackbirds going off all over the place, but none were in sight.

We went for a walk around Willow Rock (we didn't spot the Woodcock) the Riviera (nice bunch of Song Sparrows), and the Pin Oak swamp (nothin'), then returned to Evodia where Kevin (a very good birder) told us he had in fact seen the Woodcock at the Oven, and kindly led a small group over to see it.  With his help, we got a nice view:



Eventually we went back to Evodia, where the RWBBs finally came out before being flushed by our final first-of-season sighting:  an entitled asshole letting his dog run off leash.  Spring is coming!

Pine Warbler reported in Central Park

In keeping with the name of the blog, I am happy to share with you a rumor of a warbler. On Sunday, Angus Wilson reported a Pine Warbler on ebird. Marie Winn's blog ran a slightly expanded version of Angus' report: "Around 1:30 this afternoon, I noticed a dull-colored PINE WARBLER feeding appropriately enough in a pine close to the King Jagiello (Poland) Monument in Central Park. It flew south towards the Maintenance Meadow."

That's the same behavior I saw in my first warbler of the year on January 3, a bird I IDed as an extraordinarily dull Yellow-Rumped Warbler. I doubt it's the same bird. Surely somebody would have seen it in between.

Anyway, there you have it. Warbler! Six weeks from now or so, we'll be covered in them. I hope.